a year and a week
by selfsame
Summary: Fred&George: first words and recognition. comments very much appreciated, if you have any.


comments much appreciated;  
  
please do not post elsewhere.  
  
A YEAR AND A WEEK  
  
by  
  
selfsame  
  
they like to tell me that story, the one about when we were eight months or so. Mum and Dad constantly kept one eye each on Fred and me, watching and waiting for the emergence of our first words, bragging to their friends that what Weasleys lacked in money and prestige they made up in determination and cleverness.  
  
Bill and Charlie both spoke before nine months; Percy spoke at seven. even though Mum and Dad said they were certain Fred and I would follow suit, I think they were nervously, secretly hoping they'd be right and we wouldn't disappoint.  
  
three days after we turned eight months, Mum woke us up from our naps to give us a bath. when she took me away from Fred, I started crying and wailing and reaching out for him, and in the middle of all that waffling Mum says she heard me distinctly say, "Fred."  
  
he was my first word; wish I could say I was his. even though Mum went hysterical and screamed Dad into the room to hear me cry out for Fred, Fred didn't follow suit, no matter how much prompting he was given. it took him another week to catch up, and even then, he missed the point entirely. we were sitting at the table then, laughing and flapping our arms at one another, with Charlie flicking food at us from his chair across the way, and Fred's hand somehow landed flat on my head. as though to cement his point (however incorrect a point it was), he said loudly, still giggling, "FRED."  
  
which made Charlie crack up laughing and call for Mum, who naturally ran in shrieking and insisting that Fred say it again, caring more that he had spoken than that he had addressed me by his own name. once he complied, she screamed for Dad, who, like Charlie, also couldn't stop laughing.  
  
it was an easy mistake to make, really; at eight months, most kids don't know their twins from themselves— they don't understand the difference between the other twin and their own reflection in the mirror. Fred's always been self-assured, or really, self-absorbed, and to think that I was just an extension of himself was a normal conclusion for him to draw. but somehow or another, I always understood— I always understood that he was Fred, I George, that we were two halves of a whole, not simply extensions of one another.  
  
for a whole year, he called me Fred. I'd shout his name out to summon him, and in an automatic response, he'd parrot back the same name. no matter how many times Mum or Dad rebuked him, tried to make him understand that I was George, he still seemed to think that he and I were duplicates of one person— that person being him. I should have been offended that he considered himself the real human and me no more than his clone, but I wasn't, only powerfully distressed, despite how young I was. it used to make me feel worried, scared that I didn't exist, didn't matter, was nothing more than his extension. still does sometimes, like everything else does, when we're caught up in things and don't say much to one another, when the silence to him stands for rest and concentration and to me stands for discomfort and mistrust.  
  
Mum and Dad thought we were different back then— it was easy to tell us apart. Fred was a boisterous and mischievous little brat, and while I followed him about and took part in his games, I was the miserable one. I felt wretched, dejected that he didn't recognize me— that he didn't know me. for the entire year, I watched him, and waited as anxiously for him to say my name as Mum and Dad had waited for us to speak at all, but each day passed emptily, taking with it the hope of recognition, of the reciprocation of my appreciation of him.  
  
the way I see it is, either it took him a year and a week to catch on and to reciprocate, or it took him a year and a week because it didn't matter to him, because he was too young to understand, had no inclination to make sense of my importance to him, if he felt any measure of the necessity I felt.  
  
Fred forgets the story all the time; asks Mum, "did it really take me a whole year to call him George?"  
  
I want to say, "a year and a week, Fred."  
  
I want to say, "and I don't forget one day of it for a single moment." 


End file.
